The Two Sword Styles
by SufferingSamurai2012
Summary: The comparison of two sword styles...Hiten Mitsurgui and Kamiya Kasshin.
1. Chapter 1

Edited: Just changed some minor things...I hope you like it

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Blood splatters the night. Battousai swings the blade one final time and the last man goes down. Or so he thought.

Battousai rarely messes up. Almost never misses his mark. Tonight, however, he didn't see the man in the alley. The man too scared to move. A man who studied as a samurai and, in what he knew to be his final moments, couldn't help but ponder the sword style of the red-headed assassin.

Hiten Mitsurugi-ryu.

The legendary sword style that idolizes Shinsoku, god-like speed.

The sword style of the Battousai.

Lightning fast. Inescapable. Deadly. Nothing can stop it. None can stop Battousai. In a matter of seconds, his opponent is dead. The gleam of the blade's movement, the amber of his eyes, and a flash of red are the last thing they'll see.

Many call it the style of the demons, and maybe it is. Nothing should be able to move that fast. Nothing should be able to strike in nine places simultaneously. It truly must be the work of the devil himself.

How appropriate. The devil teaching a man considered to be a demon.

Blood spills in the streets as the demonic blade is sheathed by the demon-man.

He struck so fast the man didn't even see it coming. The blade was unsheathed and re-sheathed in the span of a breath.

In that breath, four men went down. He, himself, left in the shadows.

The man stops breathing as the assassin slowly turned. Blood froze and mind paralyzed, the man could only watch as Battousai turned to face him.

A pause that seems to last for a moment and an eternity surrounds the two men.

The red, the amber, and the silver joined to form one color as Battousai pulled out his blade to finish the job. If there was ever to be a name for those combined colors, the man thought, it would simply be death. As Battousai took his first step, the man wondered if there was possibly a word in another language to describe it.

When the distance between him and Battousai was cut in half, the samurai couldn't help but think that it was almost beautiful. Life and Death. Both in one sword, held by one man. The one man deciding between two options. Let live? Or die?

With the final step, Battousai swung the blade up before crashing it down, slicing the man's chest wide open. The man fell, his lifeblood squirting onto the navy gi of his murderer.

All was quiet, and in the last moment the man gave a weak chuckle.

"Beautiful," he breathed, blood bubbling in his mouth.

The light faded from his eyes, and the blood stopped pumping as Battousai gave a sigh and turned to walk away.

There was another black envelope waiting. He and his sword would be ready.

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A/N: Hope you enjoyed this! Please Review


	2. Chapter 2

Hope you enjoy this last one! I feel pretty good about it :)

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A man stands alone in his dojo. With bokken in hand, he slowly goes through his warm-up. The muscles beneath his gi flex and shift according to his will. There is nothing. There is no one. There is only him and his sword. The speed increases as does the difficulty. Sweat glistens on his flesh, leading up to the burning of limbs as they are pushed closer and closer to their limit. Soon his feet leave the ground. His body turns in dramatic aerial feats that would leave a crowd breathless. His mind is lost. There is no focused thought. It is no longer his brain that is in charge. It is his limbs. The pulsing of his heart creates a steady beat for his body to train to. No distractions. No emotions. He's just a creature reacting on instincts.

Until the patter of little feet make themselves heard.

The leaps stop. The body stops. The mind regains control. Wiping the sweat from his brow, he looks to the doorway where his child has appeared.

Her already long, black hair cascades down her small back. Her miniature kimono wraps snugly around her, keeping her from the chilly clutches of the autumn winds. Her eyes are of the deepest blue, the eyes of her mother.

They stare at each other for a moment before the child runs to her father. As she leaps into his arms, he notices the tears running down her round cheeks. He waits silently as he holds his crying daughter, knowing that she will soon tell him what is causing her so much distress. His hands do countless, reassuring circles on her back before she gains enough control of her hiccupping voice to speak.

"Father, people are mean! They are so mean! They say such mean things about everyone! They are rude, and angry, and awful, awful, awful!"

He continues rubbing his daughters back, allowing her to let her emotions spill forth with the force of a hurricane.

"They talk bad about you right to my face! How could they do that? They don't even know you! They talk bad about the sword style you practice and they insult me every day for wanting to learn what my father has taught. They call me a boy all the time and say that I make an awful girl! They tell me that I should stay home and have babies! They think they know everything but they're stupid because everyone knows you can't have babies until Kami gives them to you after you're married! Some people say they can't be my friend because I am practicing swordsmanship! They are stupid! They are stupid and they are idiots and I hate them, hate them, _hate them_!"

The man leans away from the child to look at her blotchy face. Tears had made some of her hair stick to her cheek, and tears hung from her eyelashes. Brushing these things away, the man cups the small girl's cheek.

"Child, you must never say you hate someone," he says calmly. "To hate someone is to be angry, and to be angry is to never become a good swordswoman."

Childish rage flashes across the girls face. The young one thumps the man's arms with her tiny fists. "If being a good swordswoman means that I have to be nice to people who are mean to me and my family then maybe I don't want to be a swordswoman anymore!" She scowls up at her father.

The man calmly and coolly raises an eyebrow at the petulant child. "The sword-style I teach, Daughter, is not one for the feint-hearted." He sits himself on the floor, gathering the frustrated child in his arms. "Many samurais learn the ways of war and destruction and chaos and death. It is easy for a man or woman to fall into habits as these." He lays her in his arms as he had when she was a babe and begins to rock her slowly. "It takes one who is truly strong to stand in the wake of such temptations and not give in. That is why I teach what I teach. I have given men and women a tool to stand against this tide of evil."

The girl glares up at her father. "That's not changing my mind, Father. I'm not going to be nice to people who aren't going to be nice to me."

The man gazes into the eyes of his angry child and shrugs indifferently. "You must choose your own path, Daughter. But know that in order to follow my teachings—in order to truly desire to preserve life and not end it—one must learn to love everyone. Do not discriminate based on age, gender, personality, past, present, or future. Love those who love you; love those who hate you. Only then will you truly understand what I teach."

The girl pushed herself out of her father's arms and stood in front of him, arms crossed. "You're asking for something that is impossible," she said, eyes still full of anger.

The man props himself up, placing his hands behind him, and watches his daughters proud and angry expression. "If you believe that it can't happen then it won't. If you don't believe in this, then you're not strong enough to live by it."

The girl's eyes widen in disbelief and rage. "I _am_ strong enough!" The man stays silent. Conflicting expressions cross the young girl's downcast face. Seconds pass slowly as an internal battle is fought inside the tiny chest of the little one. "I _am_ strong enough," she all but whispers. He remains quiet.

Minutes pass with the look of distress continuing to etch itself upon the girl's features.

With a sigh, the father opens his arms his little girl. Within moments, she's pressed against his chest, dampening the front of his gi. He kisses the top of her head and says, "It's one thing to say that you're strong enough, Daughter. It's quite another to actually prove it."

He slowly grips her arms and holds her out in front of him. "Whether or not you are strong enough is something you'll have to discover for yourself."

His daughter's eyes fall to the ground. "Yes, Father."

The man reaches up with a large hand to wipe away her stray tears. Pushing her hair behind her ears, he rises to his feet and gives the top of her head a quick kiss. She quickly turns her back on him and heads toward the exit.

As she enters the doorway, the man calls out for her. She turns and looks at him. "I love you, Kaoru."

A small smile lights itself on her features. She waves at him and says, "I love you too, Father."

Kaoru leaves the dojo and the man turns his attention back to his practice. The whirling of limbs and weapons begins anew. The body gains control as the mind fades away into nothing. He continues his exercise to the beat of his heart, but now something else lies beneath the tempo of his workout. Out of his entire life he now knows, beyond a shadow of a doubt, one thing.

_She is strong enough_.

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A/N: I really enjoyed writing this piece. I truly believe that, out of the two styles, Kamiya Kasshin would be the harder one to learn. It takes true committment to stick to something like this. It takes real emotion to do this while the Hiten-Mitsurugi is extremely distant...but that's just me :)

P.S I'm sorry if this a/n didn't make sense...I'm writing this really early in the morning with extreme lack of sleep...

P.P.S. REVIEW!


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